


Hearth and Home

by Clarebear



Category: Game of Thrones (TV)
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-02-10
Updated: 2018-02-16
Packaged: 2019-03-16 11:38:53
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 5,196
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13635528
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Clarebear/pseuds/Clarebear
Summary: Jon and Sansa in Winterfell at the beginning of Season 7. Two broken people trying to rebuild their home, their army and their relationship.





	1. Chapter 1

It was over dinner when Sansa first noticed. The Great Hall was loud, the walls echoing with the din of voices and the clanking of cups and the rise of bawdy laughter. Fires crackled in stone hearths and serving girls wove among tables with trenchers and ale. At the center of the dais sat Jon.

Sansa looked up the table at him. Do you feel it too? she wondered, watching him. The warmth? When Jon glanced up from his discussion with Lord Hornwood, his eyes found Sansa’s for a half moment before slipping past her. His smile landed on the Karstark girl instead.

A lord’s smile, tight and gracious. Not the true one that Sansa remembered from when he was a boy.

Sansa felt her brow want to furrow. She held her forehead smooth, her expression airy as she as the turned her attention to her dinner partner.

“Lord Cerwyn,” she said, reaching for her cup so the sleeve of her dress slipped back, letting slip the delicate line of her wrist. “Tell me of the roads in the east. I do hope you didn’t meet trouble on your way to Winterfell.”

 

***

 

In the small council meeting the next morning, Sansa saw it happen again.

The argument was over supplies and supply lines. How much millet, how much barley, how much beer, how much bran. Should salted cod be brought in from Bear Island, or purchased in bulk from the Ironborn and shipped north?

“This is simple arithmetic,” said Lord Robett Glover, “not politics. We need food to feed five thousand soldiers. I don’t care if it’s sold from the witch Cersei herself, if it’s a third the price, we can feed three times the men—”

“Men _and_ women,” interrupted Lady Mormont. “Good Northern soldiers who don’t want to eat the half-rotted fish that rapists and pillagers caught in warm waters six weeks ago.”

At the head of the table, Jon pushed his hair back, holding it away from his face. He closed his eyes. They had spent the past hour debating whether venison strips were better preserved between layers of burlap or bleached hemp.

“It’s not the quality to be concerned about,” said Davos. “Although the Lady’s right—fish from Pyke won’t make it halfway up the coast before the scale rot sets in. It’s what the Ironborn would do with the coin we gave them. We don’t want them raising ships with Winterfell gold that find their way into our waters.”

“I would rather risk foreign ships in our waters in five years than the certainty of soldiers with empty bellies in five weeks.” Lord Glover’s voice rose to a growl. “My bannerman would rather eat reeking fish than no fish at all. We have neither the time nor the coin to be picky—“

“So we should forget all sense of loyalty and prudence?” Lady Mormont nearly stood from her chair. “I thought we’ve shown enough fickleness over the past month.”

“Lye.” Sansa said.

She had been joining the small council meetings for weeks now, but this was the first time she spoke. All eyes on the table turned to her, including Jon’s. His head lifted in surprise, his gaze catching hers for an instant before immediately slipping past her to find a spot on the wall.

He won’t look at me, Sansa realized, pushing down whatever felt annoyingly like hurt in her throat. She would not be so fragile as to feel slighted by something so small.

“And tallow,” she added, now that she had the room’s attention. “Lye and tallow.”

There was a long stretch of silence.

“My Lady?” Ser Davos finally asked. Out of the corner of her eye, Sansa saw Littlefinger smirk. After all, it was a tactic he had taught her. If you need to fight to be heard, no one will listen to you. Find a way to speak into silence, and make them beg to hear every word that passes your lips.

Sansa turned to the Mormont girl. “Lady Mormont, how much tallow does Bear Island produce a year?”

“Two thousand barrels, if the season is fair. Three thousand in a good year.”

“And this year?”

“Less.”

“Why?”

“I don’t see how this is relevant.”

“Bear Island sells two goods to the mainland: salted cod, and tallow. When I was in King’s Landing, all the best candles from the most expensive chandlers on High Street were made from Bear Island tallow. But now that the war has cut off the trade routes to the South, there aren’t enough people to buy the tallow you make. So for your people to make a living, you have to sell your fish for a higher price. But there are other uses for tallow besides candles.”

“Ship grit,” said Ser Davos, understanding. “Clever, my Lady.”

The lords at the table still looked confused.

“Tallow is used to waterproof the walls and decks of ships,” Sansa explained. “It must be applied regularly in order for vessels to stay afloat. This is something that our kinfolk in the Iron Islands have a particular interest in.”

Lady Mormont stared at Sansa, stone-faced. “The House of Mormont will not trade with the House of Greyjoy for as long as I breathe.”

“You wouldn’t. Winterfell—with his Majesty’s permission”—Sansa glanced up the table at Jon—“would buy your entire season of tallow, along with all the salted cod you can spare. We will pay you one third of the price you asked for the fish, but for the pair you will be more than compensated.”

Lady Mormont kept her gaze even, her mind working through the tradeoffs. She was measured, Sansa observed. Quick-tempered on matters of honor and justice, but measured when it came to the welfare of her people.

“You would still sell the tallow to the Iron Islands,” Lady Mormont said at last.

Sansa nodded. “Yes,” she said. “Or more accurately, trade it. As Lord Glover said, we have five thousand soldiers to feed. We need the fish. It still helps the Greyjoy’s maintain a fleet they may one day turn against us, but I’d rather pay them in deer fat than in gold.”

The men around the table were nodding. A few side conversations took places in low voices. Sansa felt Jon’s eyes on her. She tried fleetingly to meet his gaze, but he looked away.

From the far end of the table, a voice said, “And the lye, my Lady?”

Littlefinger. Sansa met his gaze, taking in his wry smirk, his fatherly amusement, and the darker layer of lust that always edged his expression in moments like this. She could read his mind. _I made you_ , he was thinking, watching her. _I took something fragile and forgettable and made you sharp._

“Lye is an ingredient most commonly used to make soap,” Sansa said to the group. “It has another use as well. When I was in the south, I tried a curious delicacy from the Free Cities: jellied whitefish. It was made of halibut soaked for seven days in lye. After months at sea and in storage, the fish was perfectly preserved.”

Discussion set in. Conversation and argument until Jon spoke from the head of the table. “It’s decided then.” His voice sounded tired, but resolute. “We'll feed our soldiers Eastern delicacies made of Pyke-caught cod traded for Mormont tallow.”

Lord Karstark gave an angry snort. “If Ned Stark were alive,” he said, “he would never have agreed to a plan like this. Neither would the Young Wolf.”

“Perhaps,” said Littlefinger, “And perhaps that is why neither Ned nor Robb Stark are alive.”

 

***

 

“I didn’t realize you knew so much about ships, My Lady.”

Ser Davos stood outside Jon’s meeting chamber, his hands looped behind his back in a soldier’s relaxed stance. He had an easy way about him—like a grandfather from the stories. Wise and gruff and noble.

Sansa gave him a smile. “Not ships, Ser Davos. I know very little about ships. I know a lot about fine-made candles and exotic smallplates imported from the East.”

Ser Davos returned her smile with a small one of his own, and nodded as if he understood. But Sansa could still make out the air of questioning in his expression. He didn’t believe her.

She debated whether to explain. That it had been Tyrion, her first husband, who taught her the uses of lye and tallow and countless other commodities. That he had received a report every week that detailed the price of a hundred items from a dozen locations across Westeros.

“Becoming rich,” Tyrion had told her one morning, when she had woken in their bed to find him already at his work table, “is what gets all the glory. It’s staying rich that takes the real work. Come. Sit with me.”

Sansa had wrapped herself in her sky-blue robe, the one embroidered with silver larks and leaves. She curled herself into the high-backed chair beside him, and watched him circle places in the ledger where prices were mismatched or fluctuating. Morning sunlight streamed in through the windows overlooking Blackwater Bay.

It had surprised her, what a good a teacher Tyrion was. That he seemed to enjoy it. He talked her through supply and demand, through product substitutes and complements. Through debt leverage and how to measure the profitability of different investments. She had been slow to understand, but he had had endless patience.

“You’ll need to know these things,” he told her, after describing for the tenth time the difference between compounding and simple interest rates, “if you’re to one day manage the household at Casterly Rock.”

He had seemed uncomfortable after he said it, and busied himself by refilling his morning wine. Inexplicably, Sansa felt herself blush, and she looked down at her hands in her lap. She had never been sure why.

Standing at the door of Jon’s antechamber in Winterfell, cold seeping from the stone walls despite her furs, Sansa willed the memory away. It was lifetimes ago. It would not endear her any further to Ser Davos to remind him of her former marriage to a Lannister. He already didn’t trust her. For now, she would stay the naïve little girl who loved beautiful things.  

It was warmer inside Jon’s meeting chambers. Fire danced in the hearth, and the torches that lined the walls provided enough light to read by despite the late hour. A heap of white fur in front of the hearth was the shape of Ghost sleeping.

Jon was bent over his map table. As usual, when he glanced up at their entrance, his eyes slid past Sansa to fix on Davos. Sansa held her back straight, her head high as she stared directly at Jon. She would look at him, even if he refused to look at her.

“It’s past midnight, Your Majesty,” Davos said.

“I’m aware.”

“This could wait until the morning.”

Jon sighed, and straightened. “The Others don’t sleep, Ser Davos. I don’t see why I should either.”  

Sansa held her tongue. _Fool_ , she thought at him, as Davos began to lay out a series of sea maps that outlined Westerosi shipping lanes. _We need a king, not a martyr._

Jon and Davos surveyed the maps, tracing and retracing water routes. Sansa watched and listened. Jon was uncertain. He asked too many questions. What if the thaw comes early? What if the winds don’t hold? How long would it take through this passage? Or this one? Or this one?

By the time Davos gathered up his maps, all three of them were bleary eyed and stupid with a hundred half-developed plans. If progress had been made, Sansa was too dull to say what it was. Perhaps she would make sense of it in the morning.

Jon sunk down onto a bench, and gave them a nod of dismissal. He rested his forehead in his hands. “Tomorrow,” he said. He spoke more to himself than anyone else. “We will revisit this tomorrow.”

Davos bowed. “Good night, Your Majesty.”

Davos waited a few moments for Sansa to follow him. When she didn’t, the knight bowed again, and took his leave.

Sansa let herself watch Jon. The slump of his shoulders. The raggedness of his beard. She wasn’t sure if he knew she was still there.

"My Lord," she finally said.

The way Jon’s head snapped up, startled, told her that she had been right. He redirected his gaze immediately from her toward the fireplace. In the flickering light, Sansa could see a rise of color in his cheeks. “What is it, Lady Sister?”

Sansa stood, waiting for his eyes. When they refused to come, she said, “Jon.”

Briefly, for less than a moment, his gaze caught hers. He swallowed and looked away again.

Sansa felt her throat tighten, and a hurt-laced anger expand in her chest. She refused. She would not allow herself to lose the last member of her family as they stood together in the same room.

"Why won't you look at me?” she asked. She could hear the begging that edged her voice, and she hated herself for it. “Have I done something wrong?" 

Jon rose to his feet, the exhaustion in his face wiped clean by a mix of surprise and concern. “No,” he said. He moved toward her, and stopped. “Sansa, no. How could you think that?"

"You don’t look at me anymore."

"I do so. I'm looking at you now." 

Sansa stayed silent.

Jon wiped at his beard. He looked away. He sank back into his chair. He shook his head, and stared at the crackling logs in the fireplace. He sighed, and leaned forward, and rubbed at his face.

“I’m sorry,” he said at last. He met her gaze, and he seemed to have to fight to hold it. “You really do look like her. Your mother.”

In the corner before the hearth, Ghost shifted. He lifted his head. Seeing Jon, he yawned, his pink tongue curling slightly as his jaw stretched wide. He shook himself to his feet.

Sansa felt herself nod. _I’m sorry_ , she wanted to say. But if she started to apologize now, she would never be able to stop. 

Ghost padded lazily over to where Jon sat, and sniffed at something near his master’s feet. Jon absently leaned down to pat his side, his palm thudding against the solidness of Ghost’s ribcage.

Jon let out another sigh. “Tell me, will you? When it happens? I'll try catch myself when I'm doing it."


	2. Chapter 2

It got better. It was purposeful at first, the way Jon would make himself meet her eye. He would hold her gaze for a second to long, and seem relieved when he was allowed to look somewhere else.

“You don’t have to stare,” Sansa told him one day as they walked along the path to the godswood.

Jon’s expression didn’t change as they walked, but from the corner of her eye, Sansa could see his lip quirk up into a smile.

“I thought being king made it so people couldn’t tell me what to do,” he said.

Sansa felt herself smile. She lifted an eyebrow. “Is that what you thought?”

“There has to be some good of it.”

Their footsteps crunched across the new-fallen snow. Behind them, Sansa could hear the sounds of Winterfell in the distance. The creaking of wheels and clanging of iron, the echo of voices fading into quiet.

“You’re wrong,” she said.

“There is something good about being king?”

Sansa shook her head. “About people telling you what to do. That _is_ what it means to be king. Everyone has an opinion. Something they think is best, something they want to try convince you to do. Being king means deciding whom to listen to.”

“You sound like Littlefinger.”

Sansa couldn’t tell if it was an observation or an insult. She stayed silent, waiting, in the way that prompted most people to explain themselves. But Jon had never felt the need to fill the silence.

When he spoke some time later, it was to say, “You’re different.”

Sansa didn’t bother to nod her agreement. It was an obvious truth, in the same way that Jon was different, in the same way that this castle was both the only home she had ever known and a place where she would never fully belong again.

When they arrived at the godswood, Jon knelt at the heart tree. Sansa stayed standing at the edge of the grove. She would not kneel in this place where the old gods had watched her wedding vows to Ramsay.

She tilted her head back, and gazed upward at bone-white branches and burnt copper leaves. Beyond them, the sky was a cold, flat gray. Sansa felt her eyelashes flutter closed, and let herself imagine what might have been.

 

***

 

During the next small council meeting, as they discussed conflicting reports that spies had brought back about the Dragon Queen, Littlefinger said, “It’s a question of whom you want to believe, Your Majesty. You need to decide on whose word you want to rely.”

Jon’s eyes found Sansa’s, his lip lifting into a wry smile. The advice sounded uncannily similar to Sansa’s scolding from the day before.

Sansa kept her expression still, and met him with the barest lift of her brow.

Jon took a drink of his water to hide his smile. Sansa followed the conversation with an expression of serene interest, and for the first time in a long while, felt a little bit less alone.

 

***

 

They stopped speaking about the old days. In the beginning, Jon would mention Rodrik Cassel as he explained the best sparring drills for new recruits, or Sansa would reference what Harwin had told her about how much water horses drank a day. But the reminders of the past made them both fall quiet, the rest of the conversation colored with the shadows of people they lost.

Over time, it became an unspoken agreement not to talk about their upbringing. They kept their conversation focused on facts and figures, the future ahead.

It was why Sansa was taken back one morning when Jon mentioned Arya.

They stood on the balcony that surrounded the central yard of Winterfell, Jon’s elbows leaned on the rail as he surveyed the training sessions below. The recruits were young—younger than Sansa had expected—and green with the sword. The wooden practice weapons they thrust about were heavy and unbalanced in their hands. Brienne walked between them, adjusting postures as the soldiers moved through their morning drills.

“I had a sword made for Arya once,” Jon said without warning. Sansa was startled into looking him. Jon’s expression was matter of fact, but there was a wistfulness to his voice that made Sansa wary. “A smallsword, hardly thicker than your finger. She named it Needle.”

Sansa wasn’t sure how to respond. A part of her felt irrationally angry with him. How dare he allow himself this weakness. Did he not think that Sansa had thought of Arya as well? That watching these girls with their weapons, it hadn’t occurred to her how happy it would have made her sister?

Sansa managed to have the strength to shove down the past. It was only fair that Jon have the backbone to do so as well.

But as quickly as Sansa’s anger had flared, it dissipated. For everything that Jon was, he was not a man skilled at hiding his inner thoughts. He had never been forced to control every emotion that might flicker across his face, to edit each word he spoke.

“I imagine,” Sansa said carefully, “that Arya was more skilled with that type of needle-work than the kind we practiced with poor Septa Mordane.”

John gave a sad smile, nodding as he watched his soldiers below. “Aye,” he said, and in that moment he looked like such a Northerner that Sansa felt her chest stricken. A Northern man who used Northern words and spoke in a Northern brogue. He was a piece of her childhood, made flesh before her, and the fear of losing him was suddenly so great she couldn’t breathe because of it.

Sansa clutched onto the railing with her hand, and waited for the panic to pass.

Jon cleared his throat, as if trying to push the memory of Arya from his mind. Eventually, after the beating of Sansa’s heart had slowed, he said. “I plan to name Brienne of Tarth my Master of Arms. She is performing the duties already.”

Sansa considered this, grateful for the change of subject. It was a good idea. Whether or not Brienne would see it that way is another question. “It is an honor for her,” she said truthfully.

“I want you to be the one to tell her. Her loyalty still lies with you.”

In the yard below, a girl hardly more than ten was knocked down, her practice sword struck from her hand. The girl scrambled to retrieve it. Her sparring partner lunged to put a boot on the blade.

“It should come from you. You are her king. The appointment is yours to make.”

“I don’t think she’ll accept the position without your permission.”

“It _must_ come from you,” Sansa said. She emphasized the words. “ _You are_ _her king_. If you are worried she won’t listen to you, what makes you think she ever would?”

“Loyalty is earned over time.”

“Loyalty is not earned. It is not a gift given to a king out of the generosity of your subjects’ hearts. It’s a necessity that a King must demand.” She looked at him to make sure he heard her. “The longer you act like you don’t have full authority over your people, the more they will begin to wonder if you don’t.”

Jon sighed. For a while, there was just the sound of clattering wooden swords, the rise of voices from the courtyard below.

“Very well,” Jon said at last. “I will meet with her tonight.”

Sansa nodded, and softened her tone. “If you invite her to this evening's small council meeting, you can make the appointment there.” Sansa would be present to make sure Brienne knew she supported the assignment, even if the command itself came from Jon.

Jon nodded. “On the subject of court appointments,” he said, his gaze still focused on the activity in the yard. “I spoke with Littlefinger yesterday. He suggested I name you my Master of Strategy.”

Sansa stared.

“In adherence with your most recent advice, I am appointing you by royal decree. I will not accept no for an answer. Any questioning on your part will be interpreted as undermining my authority.”

“I thought you didn’t trust Littlefinger,” Sansa finally said.

“I don’t. I trust you.”


	3. Chapter 3

She was still in Jon’s meeting chamber when the raven arrived.

“From Dorne, Your Majesty,” the page said. His hair was sleep-mussed, his cheek creased from sleep. It occurred to Sansa to wonder about the time. Was it three hours past midnight? Four?

Jon dismissed the page. He read the message, and handed the parchment to Sansa. Once she had finished, she held it over the candle to burn. She waited for Jon to speak first.

“She signed it with the Martell seal,” Jon said. “Can you still call a house by its name if all its blood members are dead?”

“Ellaria Sand controls half the southern continent. She can call herself whatever she wants.”

Jon exhaled, and indulged in his habit of rubbing at his face. “Back-stabbing snake,” he said, speaking into his hands. “Prince Doran was a wise ruler. A good ruler, who cared about peace.”

_Now he’s a dead ruler,_ Sansa thought.

“How long until the envoy arrives,” Jon asked. “A fortnight?”

Sansa nodded. “Perhaps sooner. We will need to tell the scouts.” It would be a stupid way to stop alliance talks before they began—accidentally killing the emissaries.

“She’s already declared for the Tagaryen girl. What does she want from us?”

“I imagine it’s what the emissaries will discuss when they get here,” Sansa said, standing up. Her legs felt slightly unsteady after going hours without use.

She had her own ideas about the reason for the Dornish visit. Ellaria was a new ruler with a tenuous hold on Sunspear and four unwed daughters. It didn’t take too many leaps of fancy to imagine what she might be after in Winterfell.

“Go to bed, my king,” Sansa said. “We can speak more about it in the morning.”

Jon exhaled through his nose. “Don’t call me that,” he said.

“And since your unlucky page is already awake, you may as well wake your valet. You could use a bath.”

 ***

As Sansa crawled beneath her bed furs in her room, shivering, the sky was greying in the east.

_You’re mothering him,_ she thought to herself. She had replayed their last conversation in her mind as her maidservant readied her for bed. She didn’t like it. She didn’t like anything about this at all.

She was right to be uneasy about the Dornish visit. For all the political advantage that a marriage between Snow and Sand would bring, Stark kings had hardly been lucky with arranged marriages in the past. And Ellaria Sand was as slippery as an eel soaked in grease.

That wasn’t what bothered her. What alarmed her was how reflexive her reaction had been when she realized the visit’s intent. Opposition had twisted in her gut, everything about her saying no.

Staring at the shadows of the canopy above her, Sansa had a memory. Cersei, sitting across the dining table from her in the Red Keep, watching her son watch Sansa. The way Joffrey had leered at Sansa and toyed with her, his want of her clear. Cersei’s expression hadn’t made sense to Sansa at the time, but she had understood what it meant since then. A mother realizing she was no longer enough to fully satisfy her son. Joffrey was moving into a world where Cersei had no power to follow, and the queen had hated Sansa for it.

Sansa turned over in bed, digging her face into furs. They smelled of must and of candlewax, the same way they had when she was girl.

Jon was her brother. He would be her brother whether he was wed or not. Sansa would not be another woman whose judgement was skewed by an irrational possessiveness over her family.

She resolved to approach the Dornish marriage talks with the impartialness that an opportunity like this deserved. 

It calmed her mind, this commitment to herself, but it didn't help the slightly sick feeling that still clung in her middle. The sun had climbed high in the sky before she fell asleep.

 

***

 

“A feast,” Jon repeated, as if Sansa had suggested they serve Ghost for dinner with a side of cranberries. “We have barely enough food to feed our own people. Now you’re planning to fatten up the usurpers from Dorne?”

“They’re envoys,” Sansa said flatly. “I doubt any of them personally beheaded Prince Doran.”

“It hardly matters. They’ll dine on bread and salt and whatever is left over from afternoon mess. If it’s good enough for our soldiers, it is good enough for them.”

Sansa sighed. She had expected this conversation to go poorly. It didn’t help that she had been forced to bring it up in the stable yard as Jon was readied for a set of cavalry drills. She had to squint upwards to address him where he sat astride his war horse.

“Have you ever met the Dornish?” Sansa asked. She lifted a hand to shield her eyes against the winter sun, and stepped out of the way as Podrick Payne worked to check the fitting on Jon’s stirrups. After Brienne was appointed Winterfell’s Master at Arms, Podrick had taken over as Jon’s squire.

“No.”

“They’re… a sensual people, with particular tastes. They would consider it the gravest sort of insult to not be provided a proper royal welcome feast.”

Podrick finished his duties, and thumped Jon’s mount on the rear flank.

“I consider the gravest sort of insult to murder your sovereign,” Jon said. He drew the reins to the side, his horse dancing a few steps before it turned in a half circle to leave. “The answer is no.”

Sansa watched him depart, annoyed. Next to her, she heard Podrick sigh. “It’s a pity, My Lady,” he said. “A feast would have sure been nice.”

 

***

 

“It’s not only for the Dornish,” Sansa tried a different tack later that night. “It’s for your whole court. Everyone has been working hard. They need a night to celebrate.”

Jon glanced up at her from where he was oiling his scabbard. “Celebrate what. We’re preparing for war.”

“That makes it all the more important. Your soldiers need to be reminded of the good times, about kinship and laughter and food. They need to remember what they’re fighting for.” She hesitated, weighing how far she was willing to take this. "Even our Lord Father had feasts.”

Jon stood up to hand the scabbard to Pod, who was standing uselessly waiting with the naked blade. It was a Stark tradition to maintain your own sword.

“Father,” Jon said, “had a court that trusted him, and an enemy with a heartbeat.”

“Your court does trust you.”

“I’m not having this argument again. That will be all, Pod. Thank you.”

Jon turned to go into his private sleeping chambers, where etiquette prevented Sansa from following. There were already murmurs around how much time the two of them spent together alone. As far as gossip went, Sansa found it an odd sort of relief to be whispered about for stories that weren’t true.

“My King,” she said after him.

“I told you not to call me that.”

“Jon,” she said sharply.

He stopped, and turned.

“This is important,” Sansa said. “I know it feels foolish to you. I know you don’t want to waste the stock. But I’ve been in the South. I’ve spent time with the Dornish, I know their ways. A welcome feast may not guarantee that the alliance talks will be successful, but a lack of one makes it certain that they won’t be.”

As she spoke, the felt her frustration ebb away, replaced by a strange, seeping awareness of her own body. Of her own physicality, standing there, her arms at her sides, her hair loose down her back. All the places where her dress molded against skin.

Was it because of the way that Jon was looking at her? Or was he looking at her like that because of this thing that was happening to her body?

She finished her argument with less strength than she had intended. “I wouldn’t be fighting for this if it didn’t matter.”

 It took a few moments for Jon to react. He tore his gaze away, and cleared his throat. He nodded. “Aye,” he said. “I know.”

For once, Sansa was grateful not to have his eyes. “So you agree with me,” she managed to say. “There will be a proper welcome feast.”

Jon sighed. “Do I have a choice?”

“Always,” Sansa said. “Roast pig or beef?”  


End file.
